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Not Applicable
Not Applicable
The present invention is a method for protecting a ground plot, or hydroponic system, or any growing arrangement of plants from fungal infection, and for inhibiting the growth of fungus in the environment on the atmospherically exposed surfaces of the plants. It has been found by experiment that weak solutions of nitrates are an unfavorable environment for the germination of fungal spores and for their subsequent development. It appears that the dissociated nitrate ion has a fungistatic effect, which has been found to occur under certain conditions using various fertilizer quality nitrate salts. The effect extends to fungi on the ground surface as well as on the plant surfaces.
The present invention does not build on any prior art utilizing the effect of nitrates on fungal spore germination in the field of plant husbandry. However, its well known that nitrate salts are effective food preservatives, especially with respect to combating spoilage, the chief agent of which are fungi. The application of this effect to plant husbandry must take into account the fungal reproductive mechanism to provide the inhibitor when conditions favor germination of fungus spores. The fungistatic effect of nitrates has not been employed in the agricultural community, as evidenced by the growing dependence on complex commercial fungicides designed to create a toxic environment for fungus. Unfortunately, such fungicides also negatively impact the environment of other species as well.
It is also well known that fungal propagation, and thus fungal infection of plants, occurs in darkness and requires the presence of some moisture at a proper temperature. Such conditions establish the point of opportunity for the effectiveness of the present invention.
The process of fertilization with nitrate salts by injection of dissolved salts into irrigation water during distribution to plants, known as fertigation, is widely practiced, as is the practice of injecting pesticides into irrigation water during distribution to plants, known as chemigation. The use of the irrigation system for distribution of a nitrate solution is the tool of the present invention, and is employed by the preferred embodiment.
With respect to the field of the use of fertilizer materials to attack fungal parasitism U.S. Pat. No. 5,800,837, entitled Plant Fertilizer Compositions Containing Phosphate and Phosphate Salts and Derivatives Thereof, provides an adequate history, but only claims an invention related to the effect of the fertilizer composition in eliminating an obstacle to the operation of phosphonate-based fungicide. Also fairly recently U.S. Pat. No. 5,891,908, Fungicidal Mixtures, directly addresses the problem of fungal infection of plants, but only offers combinations of commercially known carbamate fungicides. Both of these patents are of value here, however, in understanding the state of the art.
The present invention is covered generally by class/subclass 47/2, 26,27; 514/491, 476, 528, 539; 424/322, 601.
The present invention is a method for protecting a ground plot of plants or a hydroponic system of plants and the like from fungal infection and for inhibiting the growth of fungus in the environment on the atmospherically exposed surfaces of the plants, thereby preventing fungal infection and consequent damage to the plants. The method comprises the principal step of delivering a solution containing nitrate salts as the only solute into the environment of the plants, so that all vulnerable atmospherically exposed surfaces of the plants receive a film of such nitrate solution.
It is the object of the present invention to alter the environment on and about the atmospherically exposed surfaces of plants so that germination of fungal spores will be inhibited, and thus to prevent fungal infection of the plants through such plant surfaces.
The present invention can be used with an irrigation system that can deliver water to the plants in the form of water droplets through sprinklers and/or mist heads. Such an irrigation system may thus also be used to deliver the nitrate solution by timely injection into the irrigation flow. When the foliage of the plants is dense other methods of delivery of the nitrate solution may be used. The method which is the present invention also incorporates certain rules, which take into consideration conditions of moisture and darkness to which the plants are regularly subject, according to which the nitrate solution is to be applied to be effective.
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